Easy Virtual Machines on Ubuntu/Pop_OS!
I wanted to be able to easily spin up a VM while using my Linux laptop (I use Hyper-V on my work Windows laptop) and came across Gnome Boxes. Boxes allows for easy creation and management of virtual machines on the desktop utilizing QEMU, KVM, and libvirt.
This post will cover installing and setting up a virtual machine.
Installation
Installation of Boxes is a simple one liner and will install about 50+ packages. Install was pretty quick on my Surface Pro 5!
sudo apt-get install gnome-boxes
Setting Up A VM
To begin, launch Boxes and click the + at the top left of the screen.
A new window will appear, you can choose a Feature Download, Create Virtual Machines from File, or Download an Operating System (pretty cool feature if you ask me).
I will be choosing the a Ubuntu 22.04 Server ISO I’ve already downloaded. Next choose the amount of memory and storage space your VM will require as well as if EFI is needed. Then click Create.
Once you hit Create, you’re new VM will come into focus and automatically boot so you can complete the install.
Right clicking on the VM will allow you to open, shutdown (if started), clone (if stopped), delete, or change the preferences.
In the preferences menu, you can adjust Resources such as the amount of CPUs, memory, etc… Devices and Shares allows you to connect USB devices, ISOs, and shared folders. And Snapshots allow you to take… snapshots!
That’s it. From here you can install just about any OS you’d want to install for testing distros, software, or if you need Windows for work.